Events

Lydia zhang

Mandarin interpreter. She completed her training and received her interpretation certificate in 2012. Her background is in financial services (cibc personal banker) and she has always enjoyed working with others in some sort of service capacity.
Lydia is a native mandarin speaker, also fluent in cantonese. She is passionate about pursuing continuing education and she spends her spare time studying medical and legal terminologies and reading insurance industry magazines. This
Year she also completed mcis’ medical terminology training and successfully passed the course exam.

The key to professional interpreting, lydia says, is preparation: to arrive early, to take assignments seriously and to focus on the quality of interpretation delivery while maintaining awareness and responsibility toward the company one represents. In return, good business practices continuously bring new business to current and potential clients so the opportunities for professional growth and financial reward follow.

Gurdeep singh virk

Gurdeep immigrated to canada in 2002, attended mcis’ interpreter training program and began his professional career as a freelance interpreter for the immigration & refugee board. He was subsequently accredited by the ministry of citizenship & immigration (now mciit).

Gurdeep is a certified interpreter for punjabi, hindi, urdu and bengali. As interpretation has always been gurdeep’s passion, he feels that he is one of a lucky few who have jobs that double as a hobby and a passion. Gurdeep likes canadian outdoors, especially camping and hiking with his family.

Madina hadi

Madina immigrated to canada in 2000. She has a diploma at a teacher training college and a b.A. In child psychology (roshan university, afghanistan). She held a position as general director of afghanistan kindergartens and was the chair of the aghanistan labour law committee.

In canada, madina pursued studies in art therapy, computer literacy and languages. In 2004 she completed the mcis training and interpreting program and began interpreting in dari, pashto and persian while providing administrative and interpreting support.

Loreta murphy

Loretta murphy has been working in the languages industry internationally for over two decades, including teaching english in mexico, participating in an international language education program in japan, and co-owning a language services centre in brazil. In canada, loretta murphy has been working as an independent atio certified translator for over six years. Prior to that, loretta was an assistant manager at a toronto translation services company. She also has a background in interpretation, having served as a freelance community interpreter in toronto, and a staff interpreter in the oil sands construction industry in fort mcmurray, alberta.

Today she is the sole proprietor of loretta murphy translation services, a toronto-based translation company specializing in portuguese and spanish certified translations. Loretta holds a master’s degree in translation studies at glendon college, york university. She has recently taken a subtitling course in the glendon continuous learning program. Additionally, loretta murphy is a member in good standing with atio, atia, ottiaq and stibc.

Loretta murphy is committed to applying her experience and proven track record to her work and to the translation profession in general.

Joanne daigle

Joanne is a freelance french-to-english translator with more than ten years of experience. She holds an honours bachelor of arts degree in french language and literature at the university of western ontario and a bachelor of laws degree at the university of toronto. Joanne has been atio certified since 2006.

She enjoys the challenges and learning opportunities presented by her day-to-day work, which focuses primarily on legal, medical and personal documents. When she is away by her desk, joanne enjoys film, travel and catching up with friends.

Carolina carvalho

Carolina was born in argentina and grew up in brazil speaking spanish with her family, portuguese everywhere else, while learning english since kindergarten. Her first memories as a translator (or rather interpreter) go back to helping her mother communicate with brazilians, and throughout her life she’s had long comparative language discussions with her mother, who used to be a spanish teacher in argentina. She holds a b.A. In linguistics and englishportuguese translation (1996) and an m.A. (2005).

Her specialties include software localization, film subtitling, literature and corporate translation. She has been teaching translation and film subtitling since 2001. Since 2007 she lives in toronto providing translation services, community interpreting and continuing education in translation studies.

Valentina cova (translation)

Was born in bologna, italy. She holds a b.A. In foreign languages and literature at the university of bologna and an m.A. In
Language, society and communication at the same university with a thesis on translation studies. She is currently finishing a second m.A. In translation studies at glendon college, york university (toronto).

She had different experiences abroad, such as teaching italian in the u.S.A. Where she also studied at the university of california, davis. She has been volunteering for mcis since march 2014.

Wen ma (finance)

Has over 19 years of accounting experience at china telecom. He has been in canada for over three years during which he has been completing an accounting program at george brown college. It was wen’s great honour to do his volunteer placement at mcis (jan – july, 2014) and he considers this not only a wonderful learning experience but also an opportunity to contribute his knowledge and skills. For three consecutive years wen ma’s outstanding academic achievements are recognized by the george brown college dean’s honour list (2012-14).

Lalita krishna

Lalita krishna, is an award winning film maker, educator and trainer whose span of work covers television production, training in the not for profit sector and mentorship programs with youth. Lalita’s acclaimed documentaries on kids who change the world are used extensively in the canadian and international educational markets. Lalita runs a digital media production company which produces games, apps and websites that complement and enhance the documentary viewing experience. She has taught in the journalism program at ryerson university, and media literacy at the community worker program at george brown college. In addition to multiple film awards, lalita is the winner of the crystal award for mentorship, the trailblazer(2012) award and is the recipient of the dream catcher award given by the hope and dreams festival nj. Lalita sits on the board of hot docs- north america’s premier documentary film festival and is the co-chair of the toronto chapter of the documentary organization of canada. In this capacity she spearheads a number of programs including the docs for change initiative in partnership with mcis.

Suzy kies

Suzy kies, at age 54, suzy doesn’t quite fit the profile of the quiet retiring type; rather she seems more energetic than ever. As well as her work developing culture based programs for aboriginal youth and adults, suzy has recently been appointed to the ontario aboriginal people’s commission as their women’s representative, where she will be working with her fellow executives and their national counter-parts to bring the concerns of aboriginal women to national attention. Suzy has a background in art and more recently has been working towards a degree in psychology. She started in advertising, went to marketing and eventually social enterprise. “social enterprise is the best fit: it brings all my strengths and knowledge together. I love what I do and have no plans to stop working. My retirement plan is not to retire, they’ll have to carry me out in a body bag, then I’ll stop.”

Suzy can best be described as unconventional and innovative. Her favorite description of herself is: “I don’t just work outside the box, I don’t even know where the box is”. As her elder and adviser john rice so aptly put it: “her crazy ideas always seem to work and she makes things happen.” “it’s not that big a deal, it’s like marketing; I just look for the gap, find a way to fill it and then work like a crazy person until it happens. People are amazed at how much I get done and they always ask how I can do so much. I just tell them I don’t think about it because if I did I probably wouldn’t be able to do it.”

Languages should not be removed – they should be celebrated so that cross-language knowledge sharing practices amongst global communities can be sustained. For demonstrated excellence in effective cross-cultural communication, motivation, perseverance and commitment to the highest professional standards in our industry, we are granting this year’s mcis award of excellence for exceptional commitment to overcoming language barriers to our wonderful, dedicated translator renaud poulin.

Renaud poulin has been working as a freelance translator for english to french for different translation agencies throughout canada and the us since 1995 (part-time) and full-time since 2005. Mcis is one of his preferred clients since october 2011. In the past 5 years he has translated more than 1 million words in the various fields of environment, hr, management, health research, sciences, etc. Previously, he has worked inter alia as a trainer/teacher in adult education. His practical experience in education has particularly helped him develop a great expertise in translation of diverse educational documents and positioned him well to understand the needs of the clients and to “translate” them in precise and easy-to-read french. Renaud earned his ba at the université of sherbrooke in quebec. He lives in a lovely village of 1,200 souls located 50 minutes south of quebec city.